Fondness
by Rikkamaru
Summary: Xana was fond of the first teenager to visit. He held so much potential, but let his foolish friends dictate his actions. Odd just wants people to stop carrying him like a wounded damsel. Side-story to Confident in my Confidant.


Don't own Code Lyoko.

_Many_ things inspired this. The vocaloid song _Imitation_ by Kagamine Len, and many of the fanfics here were a great deal of help. I salute all of you and hope I can do many of you justice!

Fondness

* * *

><p>Odd stared blankly ahead as his math teacher continued to talk about…something. <em>This is so <em>boring_! Forget Xana, just keep us in math long enough and we'll all drop dead!_

Why couldn't Xana attack when boring stuff was happening, huh? Odd looked down and starting sketching Xana monsters, writing their names next to each one. First were the Kankrelats, three of them doing silly things like one tripping and another standing on the last's head. Odd smiled at seeing the smaller monsters acting so amusing. Then a Krab made its way onto the paper, staring at the three smaller monsters with its unreadable gaze.

Odd grinned as a Blok was drawn on the other side of the paper, its facing turning away slightly as if it were shaking its head. Four Hornets were drawn overhead, one watching, one upside down, and one attempting to stand on the last one's head like the Kankrelats. A Tarantula sat next to the Krab and it was clear that the monster was frustrated with their antics as it rested one of its guns against its face.

Odd frowned and looked over his drawing. This actually looked like a number of them, each one expressing the emotions he sees on them the most. But Jeremie always gets mad when he says this, insisting that they are programs, they don't have emotions. But that always confuses Odd. _Aelita was once considered a program, but she's always had emotions._ The blonde shook his head and looked at the picture again.

Slowly, as if unsure the creature should be there, Odd began to sketch the last monster he wanted to be there. The Scyphozoa appeared in the background, watching all of the others with its unfathomable gaze. Some of its tentacles were raised, as if tempted to pull the Hornets apart, but overall no emotion seemed present.

Odd smiled proudly at his creation and hid it in his bag, no wanting it to be confiscated when the teacher figures out he has no idea what a matrix is. He stared at the board again for a few minutes before his eyes were drawn to the extra graph paper he had. What if he made his _own_ Xana monster? Something that gave even them a problem.

Odd grinned and tapped his pencil. He liked a challenge. The sketches started simply; he needed to figure out what body type he wanted. He decided to make it two-legged, which would make it stand out among the other monsters. It would be a physical fighter, with a huge tail that had a metal spade on the end of it. To protect its Xana eye, which would be on its face, there would be metal plating that covered it all the way to a certain part of its tail.

So that it was defeatable, the plating would fall off after enough hits, but it had to be hit at least once by at least three Lyoko warriors. No arms, but it would have _huge_ feet that ended in metal hooves. A prong stretched to the front and back to stabilize the creature. With the exception of the silver metal plating, its skin tone would be the same tan color that Bloks and Kankrelats have, with the extremities ending in a tone similar to a Krab's.

Its face and tail blade were white, and it looked rather fearsome as it stared out at anyone that disturbed it or its creator. Odd smiled gently at the (his) monster and thought up any finishing touches. Next to its model he wrote, "secretes poison from tail, effect is like a Hornet's poison," then above that he wrote the monster's name.

Scorpion.

* * *

><p>"So, what did you guys think of math today?"<p>

Odd answered Jeremie's question by dropping his head to rest on the table. "It was so _boring_! Can we go to Lyoko later? Please?"

Jeremie frowned at Odd and looked at the others. "Well, that's one person. What did you guys think?" As the others gave their opinions Odd left and returned with a tray of food.

"So? Can we go to Lyoko or not?"

Ulrich gave him a confused and frustrated look. "Why do you want to go so badly?"

Odd dropped the tray onto the table and sat down. "I'm so bored! At least in Lyoko we can take down some of Xana's monsters."

Jeremie sighed but smiled at the other. "Well, it _is_ a Saturday and classes are over, I guess we can go over there."

Aelita, Yumi, and Ulrich just nodded. They didn't really care if they went to Lyoko or not, but they certainly weren't going to let Odd go there on his own. The gang headed to the factory and it didn't take long for Odd to be walking into one of the scanners with Yumi and Ulrich. The machine closed once he entered and the normal scanning and transferring took place. As the wind picked up around him, Odd closed his eyes, not noticing that a piece of paper had fallen from his pocket.

Odd opened his eyes again and landed lightly on the ground, the others appearing soon after him. The now cathuman grinned and looked around, still crouched on the ground where he could react quickly. He spotted a megatank nearby and, with a jubilant cry, threw himself at it. Pretty soon, the three of them were having a battle with many more monsters that just seemed to randomly appear.

After a few minutes of this, Yumi and Ulrich were devirtualized and Odd was left facing a Krab and Tarantula. Before the blonde could do anything, however, the Krab shot at him with a weird laser. It was fired normally, but the coloring was off.

Odd flew backwards from the hit and panted. "Jeremie, how many life points do I have left?" he called.

Jeremie took a second to respond, and he sounded…confused as he answered. "This is weird but Odd, you have only one life point left. I didn't think Xana's monsters could even control how hard their attacks are. Be careful, Odd; I don't know why Xana would suddenly do something like this."

"Neither do I, but something weird is definitely going on here Einstein." Odd stared as the Krab in front of him lifted one of its claws and carefully patted him on the head with it. The Tarantula circled him, and carefully prodded the parts of him that had been injured, but excluding that neither was really doing anything.

Odd tried to get up carefully, but cried out and grabbed his chest. He would've collapsed back onto the ground, but the Tarantula had moved one of its front limbs to catch him. The blonde cried out in pain again, and the Tarantula hastily moved him to where it was cradling him in its arms.

"Odd! What's going on over there?" Jeremie sounded nervous, and the sound of clicking keys could be heard around the gasping blonde. "I'm going to devirtualize you myself, okay?" Before Odd could respond, he was being turned into megabytes, and the next second he collapsed outside of the scanner.

"Odd? Odd! This isn't funny, get up!" The smaller blonde didn't answer, and instead curled up and groaned. Ulrich approached him and, following a hunch, touched his sternum. Odd immediately let out a cry of pain and curled up even more tightly. Ulrich pulled his hand back and picked up the cringing blonde.

"It looks like one of the attacks on Lyoko is still affecting Odd. Come on, we need to get him to the nurse's, and fast."

After they got to the nurse's and put Odd on one of the beds (they told her they honestly didn't know what happened, and they found Odd like this), the four walked outside. Aelita grabbed Jeremie's arm and looked at him worriedly. "Jeremie? What did Xana do to Odd?"

The taller blonde sighed and pushed his glasses further up is nose. "I wish I knew. Whatever it was, it affected Odd in the real life. I'll have to do some more research to figure out what's going on, so let's head to my room for now."

Back at the factory, the capsule that normally scans Odd closed. The computer began to run, and after seemingly random pieces of information flashed across the screen, the scanner opened again. From its depths, a metal limb stepped out.

After looking up and researching different things, none of the group was still any closer to figuring out what was wrong with Odd. Two hours had just passed and they were leaving Jeremie's room to see Odd again, when they heard some of the students whispering.

"Well, whoever it was had a knife. They said there was a clean slash across the wall."

"But who was the student that was there? The nurse looked so distressed when she said whoever it was took a student."

The group froze in its place, and Aelita gasped and started running to the nurse's office. The others caught up with her, all of them looking anxious. They looked at where Odd should have been and their fears were realized.

The bed was empty.

* * *

><p>"Okay guys, new plan. Yumi, you look for Odd and whoever took him. This is most likely a Xana attack so Ulrich, you and Aelita will go to Lyoko and shut down the activated tower!" The four were running to the man hole to get to the factory and Yumi nodded before sprinting off back to the school.<p>

Ulrich scowled a little but kept running. "Why is Yumi going alone?"

Jeremie shot Ulrich an "are you kidding me?" look and opened the man hole once he reached it. "You need to protect Aelita. Normally you could go with Yumi, but normally Odd is here."

"Whatever."

The three quickly made their way to the factory, then got to the supercomputer. Jeremie stepped off the elevator, Aelita and Ulrich continuing on to the scanners. When they stepped out, Ulrich blinked in surprise. One of the scanners was already in use. Deciding to tell Jeremie once they got to Lyoko, Ulrich nudged Aelita to a scanner and stepped into one himself.

The virtualization took little time, and once they touched the virtual ground, Ulrich called up to Jeremie. "Einstein, there was someone else in one of the scanners."

"What! I found the ID card; it's Odd! How did he get on? You need someone else on the computer to get to Lyoko!"

"Guess we'll just have to ask him when we find him. Let's go, Aelita." The two started running to where the tower should have been. When they started to get close, they skidded to a halt. Floating in front of them was the Scyphozoa and a Manta, and on the Manta's back was an unconscious Odd.

"Odd!" Ulrich started running forward but the Scyphozoa floated in front of Odd, making the brunette stop once again. He turned around to make sure Aelita was okay, only to see that Hornets had flown over and were now hovering between him and the pink-haired girl. The tentacled creature approached again and, before Ulrich could defend himself, grabbed the boy and began to access his memories. It only just began reading when it abruptly dropped him, and the Manta began to fly off.

"No, Odd!" Ulrich jumped in an attempt to catch the Manta, but a shot from one of the Hornets brought him back down. The other Hornets began to shoot at Ulrich as well, until he was devirtualized. Aelita cringed and expected the monsters to attack her, but they didn't move.

"Aelita! Xana must be focusing on where Odd is right now! Get to an inactivated tower, and I'll devirtualize you myself!" The pink-haired girl nodded and ran to a nearby tower that was glowing a soft blue. None of the monsters followed her.

* * *

><p>Xana was an unusual creature. It started as an AI in Lyoko, but slowly, as it created more and more creatures, it began to develop a "personality" of sorts. It was proud and domineering, hating humans for their believed self-importance and wishing nothing more than to extinguish them of the planet they claimed to own.<p>

Then it met the four teenagers.

Aelita was always known to Xana. She didn't belong in his world (for was what Lyoko was, his world and no one else's), and he tried again and again to dispose of her. One day, however, another person was virtualized, and Xana paused in shock.

No one was aware of this but, every time someone was virtualized into Lyoko, pieces of their memory would be given to him, having escaped from the person long enough to be copied and sent to the virus. This memory was an old one, but the emotional residue that lingered on it said it was still a sore subject to the owner.

"_Mama? Can we get a kitten, per favore?" A young child with hair that stood and flickered like a flame looked up at a woman, his purple eyes pleading._

_The woman looked down at her child in surprise and disapproval. "No, Odd, we can not. Why would you want a disease-ridden, flea-bitten animal anyway?"_

_A young girl, older than the boy, smirked and whispered to another girl. "Maybe because he's lonely, being the only flea-bitten animal allowed here."_

_The two girls giggled and Odd glared at them angrily, no one in the family noticing the tears that filled up the youngest's eyes."_

Xana was confused and looked at the human as he was being scanned. It didn't take much for the virus to design an outfit for the teen and insert that as his new design, easily replicating the hair as well.

"What's going on? Where am I? And why am I dressed up like a giant purple cat?"

The other two humans that frequented his land visited later, but neither of their memories were as interesting to the virus as the first one's.

"_Mama? Why are you awake so late?"_

_The woman looked at Odd with blood-shot eyes and turned away. "Go back to bed, Odd."_

_The now eight-year old walked closer and touched his mother's arm. "Is it about Dad? Are you waiting for him to come home?"_

_The woman roughly pushed her son's hand away from her and glared at him. "I told you to go to bed, Odd!"_

_The stubborn child glared back at her and crossed his arms. "I wanna wait for Dad too!"_

_The woman suddenly reached out and slapped her son, pushing him away from her. Odd immediately teared up and rubbed his face, staring at his mother in fear. "Mama?"_

_The woman began to sob and shouted at Odd through her tears. "He's not _coming back_, Odd! He was killed in the front lines! Your father is _dead_!"_

The first visitor also came to Lyoko more often than any of the other humans, giving Xana more of his memories and time passed. Then, the human that usually typed on the computer visited, and the virus was able to communicate with Odd for the first official time.

The blonde was in charge of the computer as Jeremie went into Lyoko, the others hoping that the visit would renew his resistance to Xana. Odd had no problem bringing the taller blonde into the virtual world, his love of art having previously pushed him into graphic design, which required that one be competent with a computer.

As he waited for Jeremie to walk around and get devirtualized, Odd began to explore different parts of the computer, his hands typing gently at the keyboard until he came across a code. Odd moved away from it and stretched a little in the chair, answering his friends' questions without really thinking about it. The code was an old fashion military encryption, and it was simple enough for the slightly military-obsessed boy to decode.

The blonde typed a little bit more, before a message screen popped up. It was designed like an instant messenger chat room, and Odd blinked at it for a moment before typing.

Hello? There was no response for a while, and Odd sighed a little in disappointment and was about to close it when a response finally came in.

**Who is this? Why are you on this messenger?**

Odd stared at the reply before typing again. My name's Odd…is this Xana?

The other side was quiet for a good deal of time. **That is the name I go by, yes, though I would rather that you humans not think yourselves worthy enough to call me by that title. You are…the first of the new humans to enter Lyoko, yes?**

Odd grinned. You can call me that. And what name would you rather go by? As a warning, any other name we make up for you will not be complimentary.

The machine seemed to disregard his question and asked something entirely different. **Why do you obey the orders of all of the other humans? You certainly seem more intelligent than them.**

What do you mean?

**Whenever you humans enter Lyoko, pieces of your memories are sent to me. You seem to have had a life more suited to giving others orders and expecting them to be followed. Why is that instead you allow them to control you when you are the stronger being?**

Odd had grown pale as Xana typed his response and was glad that Aelita had gone to the scanners to just wait for the others. She would freak out if she read this. I follow their orders because they're my friends, and friends listen to each other. Plus, since you've seen my memories, you know that I'm tired of being alone. Being the one in charge of everything makes a person more alone than anything else. Can I ask you a question now?

**You can ask, but I am certainly not obligated to answer it.**

Why do you keep trying to attack us? Why do you keep trying to destroy the world?

There was a pause, and Odd thought Xana wouldn't respond for a second, before the answer came slowly. **I am…tired of being forgotten. I was created to be the greatest artificial intelligence in the world, but when my potential was realized to be near infinite, the blasted humans who created me grew fearful of my power, and shut me down. I do not want to be left to become a log in a research journal once more, and I will see to it that this ideal will become a reality.**

Odd smiled grimly at this. Don't tell anyone Xana but…if you find a way to do that without killing everyone, I'll be rooting for you.

The sound of Jeremie's life points dropping suddenly came on and Odd snapped his eyes over to the sound. The others are going to come back soon. It was really enjoyable to talk to you. After he finished typing that, the blonde exitted the messenger and began to replace all of the encryptions. He had just finished when Jeremie came back up, muttering something about stupid Megatanks.

After that meeting, Xana began to ponder more about the first visitor and what he meant about being alone. The virus had always been alone in this world, Aelita being a filthy human and the monsters being creatures of his own design. His attempts at ending humanity for some time after that were accompanied with more memories from Odd and ponderings on being alone.

Then the (supposedly) smart human created that terrible program that was meant to destroy him. Odd proved to be a valuable fighter in this, helping to command Xana's troops and trusting the virus to deliver him to the heart of the Marabounta. At the end of it all, the blonde looked up and bowed to a few of the Hornets hovering nearby. Xana hesitated, then made all of the monsters that participated in battle bow to the Lyoko warriors.

After that, the rivalry and world-changing battles between the two groups made it impossible for Xana to communicate with the human, but the memories kept flooding in with each virtualization.

"_I love you dad." A six-year old Odd smiled at a tall blonde man you stood like a man from the military and had a kind smile._

_Odd frowned and looked down, his black suit mixing in with all of the other people there. In front of him was a coffin, the lid open to show his father with a smile still on his face. Odd slowly placed a white rose on the coffin and lowered his head. A tear fell and landed on his father's smiling face. "I love you, dad. Arrivederci."_

_About to head off to a new school, Odd looked at Kiwi and frowned. None of his sisters would remember long enough to take care of the puppy, and his mother was always against him ever owning a "flea-bitten mutt". The blonde shook those thoughts away and opened his arms. "Guess you're coming with me, my diggety dog."_

"_Hey! You guys let me out! This isn't funny!" It was Christmas Eve, and a thirteen year old Odd was banging on the bathroom door, trying to get out as his sisters laughed at him on the other side._

Xana couldn't help but feel a type of fondness for the first of the teenage visitors. His was the first memory given to Xana after being awoken, and his design and weapons were created by Xana himself, the others having their own desires manufacture their outfits. In a way, the other was also like Xana. He held within him more potential than any of the other humans could possibly imagine, and subconscious fear of this potential made them belittle the human and try to "shut him down".

Recently, however, Xana had felt the need to actually see the boy. While the boy was running around, Xana slowly whittled down his and his friends' life points until the other two were devirtualized and Odd had one life point left. But something went wrong with the last attack, and the cathuman was cringing as his teammates devirtualized him. Xana felt resentment stir within him as the humans took the boy away, but once they left, it realized something was in the scanner that the boy uses most frequently.

The virus had no trouble possessing some of the cable near the super computer, and soon it had the scanner uploading the image and transferring it to Lyoko. The creature that came into existence was both impressive and horrifying, and he accessed its limited intelligence and memories. It was created by the boy, and it was with no regret that Xana uploaded the creature into the real world with a command.

Retrieve your creator.

* * *

><p>Xana watched from the creature's eyes as it approached the nurse's office, the hallways empty for class or break. The blonde nurse that it had once possessed was there, as was the boy. Its target was gasping and curled up, his shirt removed and multiple bandages wrapped around his torso. The blonde nurse began to scream, but a flash of the deadly tail blade scared her into silence.<p>

The noise was enough to rouse the injured boy, however, and Odd blinked in confusion as the creature that leaned over him. "Scorpion?" he whispered. The creature let out an echoing coo that might've indicated contentment, and lowered its neck. Odd moved to stand and approach it, but his wound acted up again and the rush of pain pushed the boy back into unconsciousness.

As he was falling, the Scorpion caught him with its neck, and began to position him so that the boy was lying on its back. The nurse seemed to regain her courage and stood up. "Leave Della Robbia alone!" She attempted to approach the creature, but it let a sound not unlike a growl and swiped its tail blade near the woman. It slashed through a part of the wall easily and the threat kept the woman from moving. The creature then turned and stalked out of the room, its gait only changed in order to make Odd more comfortable.

It didn't take much time for the creature to return to the scanners, and it gently stepped into it with Odd still on his back. The two were uploaded to Lyoko but, when the Scorpion landed on the ground, the boy cried out in pain. The Scorpion immediately stopped moving, and Xana sent a Manta to take the boy. Odd's creature hesitated in giving over its creator, but still gently lowered the human onto the other monster's back.

Odd was startled awake by the movement and opened his eyes to see who his new carrier was. He examined the Manta for a moment before grinning a little. "Hey, Sophie. How have you been?" The Manta made a noise back and began to fly off with Odd on its back, and the blonde turned and waved at his Scorpion. "I'll see you later, Orion!" The monster did not respond, but continued to eye its creator worriedly from behind the metal plating on its face.

The boy continued to breathe in a way that, Xana's resources said, meant he was in pain and the familiar feeling of hatred welled up in the machine. The humans were supposed to care for the boy, why hadn't they? Xana called the Scyphozoa to meet with the Manta, and the two waited in the Forest Sector for the Lyoko warriors to appear.

* * *

><p>Deep inside the Ice Sector, the Scyphozoa ran scan after scan on the first visitor, holding him up as carefully as possible with two of its tentacles. It seemed the laser that the Krab had shot at the boy had burned him, and the modification to make it only take away nine life points had malfunctioned slightly which made the burn persist to the human world. The boy would need to be in the human nurse office for a while, but he would gain a full recovery if he did so.<p>

Xana felt displeasure at this but allowed it to happen, the Manta that had carried the boy previously now shooting at him until he devirtualized. There was not much else the virus could do for him.

* * *

><p>"Odd!" The blonde fell out of the scanner he had been placed in but Ulrich caught him before he could reacquaint himself with the ground. "Odd, are you okay? Odd?" The blonde's eyelids flickered before his violet eyes opened.<p>

"What's with all the shouting, Ulrich? I'm right here, you know."

The younger teen's voice was weak, but the brunette didn't care as he let out a harsh laugh that sounded a little like a sob. "Well, you're so hard-headed, I had to make sure I got to you. Come on, buddy, we need to get you to the nurse's, okay?"

"If you say so, Ulrich." Odd tried to get up, but his friend just picked him up bridal style and began walking to the school. He let out a squawk of protest, but grew quiet after that.

It didn't take long for them to get to the school, and none of the faculty thought twice of the excuse the kids gave about finding Odd. He was returned to the nurse's office and, after a few days of not moving and healing creams, he was back to normal. The others wondered why Xana had taken him earlier, but dismissed it as him wanting to kill Odd.

Weeks later, the group was celebrating the destruction of Xana and shutting down the supercomputer and Odd was typing pointlessly on a computer. Jeremie and the others ignored it except for Aelita, who sat down next to her cousin and looked at the screen. "Where did you get this computer, Odd?"

Odd grinned back at her before returning to his computer. "My mom sent it to me. She thinks it'll help me improve my grades or something. Right now I'm trying to just create a different world, you know for fun."

Aelita smiled at the blonde and stood back up. "Well, good luck with that." She returned to the others, and Odd looked at the four before removing the wristband he was wearing. It was made of rubber and looked normal enough, except for the unusually bulky top. Odd grabbed either side of the bulky part and pulled as if to force it apart.

With a soft sound, the bulky part separated, revealing a flash drive on one side and a protector for it on the other side. He put the flash drive into his computer and continued typing. Slowly an image started to form in his Odd's virtual world, and he grinned but continued to type. Finally, the image was done and the creature dropped onto the ground. It looked up at where Odd could faintly be seen, and a message box appeared.

**Creator?**

Odd smiled softly at the words and typed his own response. Welcome to your new home, Orion

* * *

><p>I honestly don't know how this got so big. OTL I really feel like there are good parts, surrounded by really, really <em>bad<em> parts.

It was only after I wrote most of this that I realized a lot of it really doesn't fit the Code Lyoko timeline. I am truly sorry about that, but it was meant to be compatible with the timeline. Please forgive me.

How much of this plays a role in CimC? _I_ don't even know that yet. But the flashbacks and the affection Xana and Odd feel for the other do play a part.

The Scorpion is a real Xana monster. It was the boss in the nintendo DS game. You can find it on Code Wiki. I had planned a battle scene, but it didn't want to be in the fic, so there wasn't much I could do.

Orion: I named it Orion based off of the hunter in mythology. It is said that Orion loved Artemis, and Apollo grew angry of this and sent a scorpion to kill him. Artemis, mourning her love, placed him and the scorpion in the stars so that they would always be remembered.

Why Jeremie didn't devirtualize Odd after Ulrich and Aelita left: They were afraid that, since the Scyphozoa was around Odd, Xana could have done something to him where, if he was devirtualized, he wouldn't come back. Like Yumi in one of the episodes.

So, there you are. Why Odd doesn't hate the eye of Xana, why his outfit was so different from the others in Lyoko, a deeper look into Odd's past and Xana's motives, and a deeper look into Odd's potential.

Please review.

Ja ne!


End file.
